Test Ride on the Sunnyland Bus

by Spagna, Ana Maria

• ISBN13: 9780803217126
• ISBN10: 0803217129
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2010-04-01
• Publisher: Bison Books

Summary

Test Ride on the Sunnyland Buschronicles the story of an American family against the backdrop of one of the civil rights movement's lesser-known stories. In January 1957, Joseph Spagna and five other young men waited to board a city bus called the Sunnyland in Tallahassee, Florida. Their plan was simple but dangerous: ride the bus togetherthree blacks and three whitesget arrested, and take their case to the U.S. Supreme Court. Fifty years later Ana Maria Spagna sets off on a journey to understand what happened and why. Spagna travels from her remote mountain home in the Pacific Northwest to contemporary Tallahassee, searching for the truth of the incident and her father's involvement. Her journey is complicated by the fact that her father never spoke of the Sunnyland experience and died unexpectedly when she was eleven. Seeking out the other bus riders, now in their seventies, Spagna tries to make sense of their conflicting stories. Her odyssey becomes further troubled by the sudden diagnosis of her mother's terminal cancer. Winner of the River Teeth Literary Nonfiction prize,Test Ride on the Sunnyland Busdeftly weaves cultural and personal history, memoir, and reportage in this fascinating look at a family and a nation's past.

Author Biography

Ana Maria Spagna is the author of Now Go Home: Wilderness, Belonging, and the Crosscut Saw, which was named a Best Book of 2004 by the Seattle Times. Her work has appeared widely in publications such as Orion, Utne Reader, and the North American Review. She lives and writes in Stehekin, Washington.

Table of Contents

Think I can serve
In Front of Speed's	p. 3
Never Go Back	p. 16
The Tallahassee Bus Boycott	p. 27
The Acquaintance of Grief	p. 39
The Forgotten Coast	p. 54
Something More	p. 67
A Highly Personal Thing
Handwriting	p. 81
Herndon	p. 94
The Cloven Hoof	p. 104
City of Hope	p. 118
Folsom	p. 134
Community Care	p. 147
A Real Difference	p. 158
Orchard Burning	p. 172
Fiftieth Anniversary
Every. Single. Day.	p. 189
Tarpon Springs	p. 209
Not Forgotten	p. 220
Heroes and Sheroes	p. 236
Always Go Forward	p. 252
Epilogue: No Big Deal	p. 262
Acknowledgments	p. 269
Table of Contents provided by Ingram. All Rights Reserved.